The United Nations celebrated the third annual Chinese Language Day at its New York headquarters on Thursday, marking its continuing effort to promote the historical and cultural significance of one of the six official UN languages.

"The UN Language Day is the effective practice of the concept of the United Nations multicultural harmony and common prosperity and has a practical significance," Li Baodong, China's permanent representative to the UN, said at the event.

The UN initiated Language Day in 2010 for English, French, Arabic, Chinese, Russian and Spanish to commemorate the linguistic and cultural diversity of the 193-member organization.

Li said he hoped that Language Day will continue to "promote dialogue and exchanges between different civilizations in the world, and to make greater contributions to promoting world peace, development and prosperity".

The event featured traditional Chinese dancing, musical performances, art exhibits and a demonstration by the Chinese Health Qigong Association. Qigong is a practice that combines controlled breathing with meditation.

Stephane Dujarric, director of the News and Media Division at the UN, said it reminded people of "the long history of Chinese culture and the wonderful way of the Chinese culture that never forgets its past and always finds a way to adapt thousands of years of tradition to the 21st century".

He said: "It (the qigong performance) is a wonderful demonstration of a culture that doesn't forget its past but doesn't live in the past. It adapts its past to its present."

The date of Chinese Language Day was chosen to correspond to Guyu (Rain of Millet) - between April 19 and 21 - on the Chinese calendar to pay tribute to Cang Jie, a mythical figure who invented the characters of the Chinese alphabet more than 5,000 years ago.

The UN also provides a Chinese-language program for its non-Chinese-speaking staff; classes are taught by six teachers.

The number of students per term has doubled to 200 at present from about 100 about eight years ago, the program's website says.

The organization also has a Chinese version of its official website and a radio unit that broadcasts news about the UN in Chinese.

Chinese is one of the oldest languages in the world, with archeological records dating back at least 4,000 years. It is spoken by one-fifth of the global population. The language has several thousand dialects, but standard Mandarin, or Putonghua, is spoken by the majority of people in China today.

Data from the US' 2010 Census shows that English, Spanish and Chinese are the most commonly spoken languages in the US.

American students in kindergarten through 12th grade, as well as their college counterparts, are increasingly enrolling in a growing number of Chinese-learning programs, said Hu Lingjun, a lecturer of Chinese from the department of East Asian languages and cultures at Columbia University.

"China's fast-growing economy is the major factor that attracts people to learn Chinese; most of my students are looking for job opportunities in China," Hu said.

yuweizhang@chinadailyusa.com